TORINO, Italy - Feb. 23, 2006 - 173 million total viewers have watched the Torino Winter Olympics on the networks of NBC Universal through the second Wednesday of the Games, pacing just one percent behind this same point during the Salt Lake Games (175 million). 43.2 million total, unduplicated viewers watched NBC's coverage of the Torino Games last night, according to Nielsen Media Research fast national ratings. Last night's broadcast featured coverage of the gold medal finals in women's slalom and aerials skiing events.

Last night's Olympics coverage on NBC rated a 10.0 household rating and 15 share for the broadcast, (8:30-11:12 p.m. ET/PT), and averaged 16 million viewers. The household rating for the primetime portion of the broadcast (8:30-11 p.m. ET/PT) is 64 percent higher than NBC's average Wednesday night this season (10.0 vs. 6.1) and is 79 percent higher in viewer delivery (16.1 million vs. 9 million).

TORINO OLYMPICS ON CABLE: Through Wednesday, coverage of the Torino Games has reached 58.9 million total, unduplicated viewers on the cable networks of NBCU, 22 percent higher than the comparable time periods last year (48.1 million) and 44 percent higher than through the same point during the Salt Lake Games (41 million).

"OLYMPIC ZONE" CONTINUES DOUBLE DIGIT GROWTH FOR NBC STATIONS: NBC's "Olympic Zone," a partnership between NBC Olympics and NBC affiliated stations, is producing double-digit gains across the country in its time period. "Olympic Zone," an Olympic "pre-game" show airing preceding NBC's primetime coverage, is up 66 percent in Los Angeles, 63 percent in Seattle, 32 percent in New York and 100 percent in Portland, Ore. versus Feb. 2005.

NBCOLYMPICS.COM CONTINUES RECORD-BREAKING PACE: NBCOlympics.com, NBC's online home of the Torino Olympics, Tuesday set its all time record for page views and has now reached 291 million, surpassing the 251.4 million for the Athens Olympics by 40 million page views. NBCOlympics.com recorded 145 million page views for the 2002 Salt Lake Games. Yesterday, with more than 25 million page views, NBCOlympics.com totaled its third most-trafficked day in history. All of the top six page view days in the 10-year history of NBCOlympics.com have occurred during the Torino Games.

The website has served more than 7 million video streams, with more than 84,000 hours of video watched on NBCOlympics.com through Wednesday, more than doubling the number of streams served over the entire Athens Games.

The networks of NBC Universal, NBC, USA, MSNBC, CNBC, NBC HD and Universal HD are providing more than 418 total hours of coverage - including the most live coverage - across the most platforms of any Winter Olympics in history of the XX Olympic Winter Games from Torino, Italy, Feb. 10-26.